The article flowing around Facebook today finally made me want to write a small blog post about responsibility in reporting.  If you don't know what I'm referring to, it is the article about Miss America 2014 and a number of people being hateful (to put it lightly) to the fact that she is Indian-American and won the Miss America Pageant.

Now my blog has nothing to do with Miss America but at the reporting that was done, and in many ways how most 'reporting' is done.  Post after post today on Facebook seemed to be about my friends screaming about racism and how they couldn't believe there were so many horrible people out there.  Hey I agree, there are plenty of hateful people out there.  But I'd like to rewind for a second and discuss what started this entire thing in the first place.

I have two problems with this article, and guess what, neither has to do with the hateful people out there, that's an entirely different subject that I'd rather not get into.  They have their own opinion and while I don't agree with it, it is their opinion.  Note:  I'm not even going to link out to the article in question because I don't believe it deserves any more attention, I'm sure you can find it if you like.

ONE.  
The facts of this story are straight up wrong, or at the very least extremely misguiding.  There are about a dozen or so horribly negative and hurtful things being said, and I'm sure there are more.  But what it fails to mention is all the wonderful and amazing things people have said. I don't know if this fact is true or not but one person posted that there were 314 million tweets posted about Miss America.  If a dozen or so were negative, do you realize how small a percentage of negative vs positive that is?  If 12 vs. 314,000,000 (negative vs positive) is where we are as a society, than we are progressing, congrats! :)

But this particular article decided to title their article "A Lot Of People Are Very Upset That An Indian-American Woman Won The Miss America Pageant."  Thanks a lot!  What exactly defines 'a lot' of people? Because my numbers are showing something much different.  If you're going to do some reporting why not give us a real statistic that takes into account all tweets for a given amount of time.  By singling out a few horrible ones, and title your article as such, you've now put a whole slue of people into a fury.  Or better yet why re-post the negative ones at all?  Are you improving anyone's lives by doing this?

Ok, I'm pretty sure I know why they did this, it attracts more attention to their webpage.  More people click on links that they're emotionally attached too.  But come on  Is this really what we're willing to do to get some attention?  The sad truth is, it is.    

TWO.  
Do you really and truly care?  Or are you looking for something to complain about.  I don't know about you but I don't even remember the last time I thought about Miss America.  Couldn't even tell you any of their names.  What I'm trying to get at is does this outcome really affect your life in anyway?  Does Miss America even really affect that much in the average persons life?

If this pageants outcome does, or you still really have strong feelings about it are you willing to do anything about it?  I mean it's one thing to complain when something directly affects your life and you're willing to take action.  It's another when you just feel like complaining.  In my opinion if you're not willing to take action, then you shouldn't be complaining.

Look I'm not suggesting I have the answers here but in my opinion I think we as HUMANS should start focusing our attention on the things that really matter.  Making our own lives better and making others lives better.  If we all just focused on those two things, all of this other 'fluff' would simply fade away, and in many cases falloff into the background.

Oh and if you want to stop these people from reporting like this.  STOP reading this junk.  Ok fine, I read it too, but now I'm upset that I did.  You can bet I won't go back to this website from here on out.  If people like this have no audience, things like this won't be reported any more.  But it's going to take all of us to take a stand to not fall into these 'marketing' traps anymore.  Can you imagine how uplifting life would be if a large portion of the news and things being reported on were positive?!?

Oh and if you know someone like this, who truly feels this way; ignore them.  It's not easy but it is simple. Ok I'm done ranting... for now :) Now go be HAPPY and don't let things like this upset you!